i do get your criticisms ,but i personally don't have those complains most of the criticism hxh gets(not just in this video) can be bog down to "it is not conventional" honestly this is one of the reasons i love hxh and every unconventional thing that hxh does feels very organic to me komugi is one of my fav hxh character ,she is such a good foil to shaipouf(very underrated villain),she is also very similar to killua in terms of what she wants from her life i do agree with your lack of female cast but there are some really good female characters like pakunoda ,komugi,melody(she plays very imp role in current manga ,plus that darkness of sonata thing might get covered in upcoming arcs) i do get your criticism on party balance thing ,but honestly it never bother me in the slightest 28:35 it is because of moments such as these hxh feels more realistic and tangible to me ,gon was only able to meet ging because netero died and fate played its part but its nt that gon didn't do anything ,maybe nothing specifically for this moment ,but had gon decided not take killua with him he would have met his father after greed island i respectfully disagree with this take, 31:47 i was addressed with illumi needle being planted in killua's head (ep 94),basically they wanted killua to have some sort of guilt trip for failing to save his friend and running away and leaving his friend behind (which of course he never did),and they prob excepted him to come back after that(of course this part is only my theory),also its not that gon and co. efforts don't have any role to play ,its there effforts that made killua realize that he have real friends ,which motivated him to breakout and speak for himself and go out ,otherwise he would have stayed in the mansion ,anti climatic sure ,anti cathartic not really plus yeah lot of hxh arcs end in anti climaxes,sometimes open ended like in yorknow and i personally love it kurapika's story is continued after anime in manga,in yorknew he is concerned about gon and killua because he is directly involved whereas the scene you are talking about he is not even aware of there situation and to me it is more like doesn't want them to be involved with him ,he is actively trying to push away his friends,but i get that its not cathartic one thing you did not notice about kurapika that how he was upset when he realize that he won't be able exact revenge on all of phantom troupe member (in ep 53),it was almost he lost his purpose of life ,i find that really fascinating

Let's see

HxH is just built different, and that's part of why I love it so much

The party balance criticism makes sense. From a meta standpoint, it explains why togashi got kauripika and leoriro out of the show for a while. He felt a redundancy. There are internal logic reasons but they were meta explanations with the balance issue.

Amazingly done

I think something that Hunter x Hunter teaches us well, it's that genre expectation; infact, genre in general, along with an expected tone are quite needless, purely marketing based concepts to do with writing, and trying to bow down to them can really take away from the possibilities of a story; being overall useless and nothing but detractors to try and conform to; afterall, art has no rules, it's "art" for a reason.

I don't really agree with the criticism at 12:14; we see the reason he's not been available; not only is he now in full suit and tie with a phone in hand, clearly waiting for a contact that isn't Leorio (intuitively from context clues, we know that it's to do with Mafia dealings.), but we see that he's finally gotten perhaps almost all of the eyes of his people, but has lost alot of himself along the way, with how depressed he seems. at the end of Yorknew, while Kurapika did in the end prioritize his friends over his enemies, he did still continue on his way working for the mob for the sake of his people's eyes, and Gon had quite the sad expression, knowing that without them being around him, he may sink deeper into darkness. what is learned one month is degraded into dust in the following several months without the people you had around you in that month. I won't spoil anything, but as the manga continues past the material the 2011 adaptation has shown, we get more of a focus on Kurapika's journey now that Killua and Gon have more or less completed their character arcs.

I really do agree with your thoughts on Killua's role. not to say the story would be better without him or anything, but I do wonder how different the story would have been if he wasn't added to the narrative.

i prefer the anti-climaxes, it's alot more interesting. i'm going to be incorporating it into my own work.

great video, a lot of information to be applied in story writing, will definitely be checking more videos the concept for this channel is so cool btw ^^

Literally when bam united with rak and then they hug my heart 😢

Omg love the video

I've been getting back into the tower of god series since s2 dropped and this video is just what i was looking for. Thanks!

I like a lot of things about the workshop battle. Spoiler: The workshop battle has some good moments, like anaak fighting ram. Well before anaak gets basically completely forgotten, and most of her plot points get taken by other: Her mother's weapon? Taken by Yuri. Expanding her character with Garam? Taken by Endorsi. Her goal of killing Zahard family members? At this point forgotten about. Also taken by viole The weakest villain the workshop battle is beta, cuz basically he is just Rachel character rehearsed, but with less motive. I guess the experiments messed up with his brain. I feel like SIU, could have made a more compelling history with beta, or simply made the mad dog more compelling instead of "big bad guy that gets soloed by endorsi with minimal help from hatz", dude has hiped so hard the whole arc. Well that is just consequence of having a high fantasy, you basically gotta dump character development and compelling characters in other to world build.

What a wonderful video ! I really want to write my own story and using my favourite manhwa to do so is really what I was searching for . Enven your critics are legitimate I really have nothing to say 😂 Anyway , keep going I love what your work ❤

Searched for your channel , glad I found your channel again! Very cool videos ❤

Looks like it's the "manipulation" which makes me so stressed when watching Link Click 🤣 Although it makes me stressed, I watch it nonetheless. The lovable stuff outweigh the stuff that traumatize me 🤣 This is such an interesting video dissecting Lick Click story points and elements in a writer's perspective 🤩 Thank you for sharing 💖

Two "friends"

Nice breakdown of what we can learn from Link Click's writing! And agreed on the part regarding the appropriate use of cliff hangers. Would be interesting to hear what you view is on the pacing and structure between seasons 1 and 2 of Link Click. In my opinion, I felt that the pacing in the 1st season was just right for the episodic nature of the story, whereas it dragged quite a lot for 2nd season (plus all the flashbacks interrupting the flow of the story). Do you think there are ways to mitigate the 'dragging' feel of the 2nd season?

I like your analytic approach, trying to figure out where the imblance in HxH is very impressive. I would however say, that the thing i like about HxH the most, and what I think makes it stand out from the rest of anime and stories in general, is how "messy" it is. It reminds me of the picture of Togashi in his dirty messy room, and I can imagine what kind of story such a person would write. The arcs are all over the place, the characters are dressed completely differently with no unique style unifying them, and the main characters have as you said different age groups and even different heights in the 1999 version, which is untypical in anime. What you could describe as "imbalance" is in my opinion for the biggest part just a creative decision. Togashi already knew that the quadri is not there forever, and that they will split up at some point, so there was no need for balancing them up perfectly, and focused more on the couple Kurapika and Leorio, and on the couple Gon and Killua. I also think that the imbalance in gender was noticed by Togashi, this is why he gave Kurapika feminine traits to add to the group ( while Leorio is masculine, and Gon and Killua are like the children, so they have a bit of a family dynamic). There is also imblance in the Zoldyck family and in the spiders group. But I like this messiness in HxH. If you have a group of four people that know each other from childhood and get a long very well, then it's great. But having a group of four very charasmatic celebrities is going to be explosive eitherways. I agree with you however on the catharsis section. It really feels too messy when it comes to keep switching storylines without resolution. I personally found the chimera ant arc the worst arc, which was terrible for me that it was the longest. My favorite has been the York New Arc because of the psychological factor.

My favorite series back Thank You

Honestly, Ed and Winry aren't as good of a relationship as Roy and Hawkeye. It's close, but not quite on par; I will die on this hill. Roy x Hawkeye forever, fight me IRL.

As an author, one of the reasons I think 2003's coverage of Shou Tucker's storyline is so powerful is of course that there are multiple episodes devoted to it, but really, that it is allowed to sizzle, and then boil over. Multiple episodes allow you to more easily do that, but that Tucker, Nina, and Alexander are the background of the for like 70% of the arc. There are small moments here and there that expand on State Alchemy, testing, the military, The Philospher's Stone, yadda yadda. But Shou Tucker, Nina, and Alexander are clearly shoved to the back and are allowed to populate the story naturally *Before* they come into focus. And Tucker's recertification becomes a lot more real both because he's helped Ed study, and also that Ed is taking the test to become a State Alchemist. It puts how hard it is to do this kind of thing into the audience's mind. And as a result, it registers very intimately that Tucker needs to come up with something. Some little 12 year old kid passed the exam, he's got no excuse to not get farther in his research. Not only that, but his funding is going to get pulled. Absolutely no one wishes Nina's or Alexander's fate to end up this way, but due to the story's focus on the regimented life and study of State Alchemy first and foremost, it allows the story to have a harder: "Out of nowhere" gut punch and allows you to more acutely understand Tucker's mindset.

This video is perfect for both anime fan and wannabe writer. I wonder if you can do this kind of video but about books. For example: Let's Write With . . . Harry Potter or Game of thrones

I think the main reason Leorio and Kurapika aren't more prevalent during the Chimera Ant arc is because the following two arcs are all about them even if they weren't fully animated. Election Arc stars Leorio and Dark Expedition is not animated but stars Kurapika. Also not to say don't add more relevant women in HXH but I always assumed this is because the show gay af? Like Gon and Killua are p clearly love interests and their one main rival is a hot guy who thinks they're hot and they spend all of their time hanging out with tough, sensitive boys. There's this shot of Gon looking at his ring while lying in the grass with Killua in the Greed Island opening sequence I will never ever unsee. And yeah that's also why I think the female roles are somewhat subversive, Canary strong, Melody feminine, bisky uhhhhhhh (Sorry bisky lol). But also there is that scene where Bisky explains that she's looking for a hot strong guy and yeah that sounds fruity as hell 🍇

For a suggestion of a Shoujo Manga to review. I would reccomend Fruits Basket.

Really good video, very well written. The only downside is that I wish you spent more time focusing on the 2003 anime. It’s probably personal bias but I definitely prefer it to brotherhood. I personally think it has better character development and I like the darker and more atmospheric tone that the show was going for. I mostly illustrate but I like to write here and there and FMA 03 is a great source of inspiration. Hoping to create a graphic novel at some point to get my ideas out in the open. Having to illustrate and plan out a story is really difficult but it’s a passion project of mine and videos like this are very cool to get more inspiration!

Awesome video and analysis of my favourite anime and one of my favourite stories! Couldn't help but subscribe! One aspect of Brotherhood that I really love is the way it handles its main themes. In particular, topics like sacrifice, redemption, the cycle of hatred and being holistic in perspectives (everyone having their own 'truth') are discussed so well! Lowart has a video in particular on the Cycle of Hatred in "Manga-hood" that I highly recommend to anyone interested in FMA. I'm curious about your thoughts specifically on the way FMA's themes are structured and how they intersect with each other. On anime recs for the channel, two animes that I'd be interested to see you cover would be Code Geass and Attack on Titan / Shingeki no Kyojin (haven't seen much Shoujo unfortunately😔).

Could you talk about one of this: Sakura Card Capter, Nodame Contable, Nana, Hanasakeru Seishounen, Ayashi no ceres or Holic XXX ?? 😆 Thank for the video🤩 I love this anime

Excellent video. Personally one of my favorite relationship dynamics which I kinda wished you touched upon was the relationship between Mustang and Hawkeye, though of course there's only so much time in one video The dedication Hawkeye shows to Mustang, not only for his connection to her father but also how much Mustang cares about her in particular being his rearguard was really inspiring to see. This, along with Roy's resolve to do well by his subordinates and helping Riza when she was at her lowest following the Ishvalan Civil War creates this wonderful dynamic between the two. I can see why so many people ship them, even though the hints of romance between the two are significantly more subtle than Ed and Winry

This is awesome! I haven't seen a lot of FMA video essays/discussions framed specifically around its writing like this, so thank you for sharing this wonderful video. One thing I'd add to the lessons we could learn from this series (that you've touched upon with Winry) is how well-rounded and relevant the supporting characters are. Arakawa is so good at effectively establishing a character's role, motive, and conflict in a relatively short time, while keeping them and their development important to either the grand epic plot or to the Ed and Al's goals, or both. I feel like there's no unnecessary or replaceable supporting character, everyone has a part to play.

Long time Anime fan here too! and also novice writer. I take a lot of inspiration from amazing stories that Anime contains. Great video, keep them coming!

Really underrated video and interesting video!

Great video!

Great video I prefer more the fma03 ending but both versions are amazing and Iearned aot in this video on how to write a great story thanks 🔥🤝🔥

I never thought of this as a part of the process, but it makes sense why when I create something that I feel the need to share it.

loved this analysis, and will use in my writing, thank you!!

This video was so incredibly well written, edited and performed! Although I agree with a lot of what you said, I still can’t shake the fact that I love this story because of its unconventional writing style, and see it as one of its biggest strengths. When I looked at how many subscribers you had I couldn’t believe it! Really amazing stuff here! Love writing forever, always. We should keep telling stories, they’re the defining beacon for interior human evolution! … Okay perhaps I overdid it a bit

Just watch YuYu Hakusho by Togashi(Same author of HxH) then u will understand what togashi wanted to do in HxH

As someone already pointed out, I think a lot of the critiques here are somewhat moot, because Hunter x Hunter as a work of fiction is different from almost any other in the sense that it attempts to make things entirely realistic from a character writing perspective. You're entirely within reason to criticize things like anticlimaxes and party balance, but I think it's unfair to say that Killua makes Leorio and Kurapika redundant, because adding to the party is inherently not the point of Leorio and Kurapika's characters - or any character within HxH. More than anything HxH is a character study, *not* one singular story. And that's the reason why it's both so successful and so controversial, because the characters are so deeply interesting and the narrative so broad and all-encompassing that it may turn people looking for a solid "hero's journey" story away from the work. That is to say, Leorio and Kurapika - and even Killua and Gon - are not and were never meant to be characters "in the party," nor were they ever meant to have individual "roles" within the narrative to fulfill. They're simply living in the world, and you could replace any one of them with almost any other typical character archetype and end up with slightly different but still coherent narrative. Not to mention, I also find that your attempt at delineating what a realistic group looks like misses a lot. If anything, the group of the four is more realistic than almost any other group in fiction, because none of the characters within the group are actually physically bound to each other. If you've watched Yu Yu Hakusho, another of Togashi's works, he attempts to do something similar with Hiei...but is seemingly ultimately shut down by his editors and his attempts to engage in a character study like HxH stifled, which is one of the primary reasons for YYH's premature conclusion. If you take a look at any one arc, especially the arcs which get the most general praise, they each consist of multiple splitscreen perspectives happening in tandem in order to develop characters and introduce core themes. The Yorknew City arc has three such parties (Gon + Killua + Leorio, Kurapika, and the Phantom Troupe). The Chimera Ant arc has significantly more than that, and the current arc in the manga has at least 10 or 15 concurrent perspectives that I can think of off the top of my head. Does this make things sometimes so detailed that it can get confusing? Of course. Does this make it so that many arcs feel slow and methodical? Certainly. Does this make it so that narration or inner thoughts within arcs can feel over the top to some? Absolutely. Those are all fair criticisms, but those criticisms are not flaws that could be fixed but rather personal complaints with this specific story structure. The point I'm trying to make is this: While Killua does seem to serve in a similar narrative role as Leorio or Kurapika, he acts as a significantly different character study. And because Hunter x Hunter is a character study and not a singular, fleshed out narrative, the fact that he serves a similar narrative role doesn't actually matter. It does allow Togashi to separate the quartet, but he could just as easily make them play off each other as he does in Yorknew City. In the current arc, it looks like he may be gearing up to do something similar with Melody and Leorio, who both serve similar narrative roles if looking at things from a purely narrative-based perspective, but are both interesting characters in their own right who can easily play off each other along with Kurapika. Taking a look at the anticlimaxes, they serve a similar function. These events, at their core, aren't meant to provide a conclusion to the narrative in order to give the audience a feeling of catharsis. Their goal is to instead provide a cathartic experience through the character study that they have presented. Both methods of using climactic events are cathartic, and saying that catharsis only exists as reward for the readers or as a climactic payoff misses the point entirely, I think. Personally, I absolutely love these sorts of stories, because they often allow for a much more emotional and thematic payoff once you make your readers care about the characters, which HxH definitely does. You have to look no further than RU-vid for "HxH episode 135 reaction" to see the amount of people bawling their eyes out, regardless of whether it's an anticlimax. So, while most of the points you make are fair criticisms, I don't think the majority of them are, or can even be considered, flaws of HxH to learn from and avoid. Because they aren't flaws. The narrative is deliberately written that way in order to dive deeper into the story's themes and the characters within it. I think making this video about "writing tips" misses the point that Hunter x Hunter is not written to be a traditional "hero's journey" story. It's something else entirely, and advice like "make sure that characters in your main party have their own special narrative function" simply doesn't apply as well as it would in other series. The tips here are good tips for writing a more traditional story, but simply don't apply to a story like HxH. Finally, I'll leave off by saying: Criticisms like this also suffered heavily for not taking into consideration the manga at all. Once again, this is a character study, and characters like Kurapika are still able to be developed offscreen, believe it or not. You seem to have gotten upset that Kurapika's final actions in Yorknew are contradictory to him refusing to answer the phone in the Election arc, but they aren't because we can see at the end of Yorknew how he has internalized his need for his friends to be safe in a need to self-isolate. And the next arc in the manga explores that, in depth, because HxH is a character study.

Good take on the subject this is very helpful, thank you 👍🏾

there are a lot of female characters.... ? they don't have to be protagonists, they need to be there to the story to not be sexist... ok i got lost

Fantastic video . I have just come across this video because i search for Anything hunter x hunter pretty much every day. In my not so humble opinion, hunter x Hunter is one of the greatest stories to be ever written and in some areas it is the best.

I actually think HxH’s anti climaxes are kind of brilliant.

I hope you will cover the stuff that happened in the manga, things get more interesting despite the valid criticism like exposition dump.

I understand the critiques on the more subversive and anticlimactic characteristics of Togashi's writing style, and I get when people actually prefer something like One Piece over HxH, but for me, that's what makes it special. It can be frustrating when the character you like so much is not involved in the events of the current arc, but that's because every one of the main four can be "the main character". They have their own methods and goals, and won't be used to get rid of some random minion just to show up, when the time comes for us to follow their journey, the focus will simply shift. That, combined with the anticlimactic ways which HxH arcs usually ends, actually makes the stories more realistic, impossible to predict, and fluid, once he can always pick up on storylines that he left open-ended. Again, I know it's not for everybody, it's actually kinda chaotic, but people who consider HxH the best, like me, actually think that because of all of these characteristics.

I always found it so interesting that Bam is perceived as a static character by most viewers. I have been a weekly reader for over a decade now, so I’m clearly biased in favor of the webtoon, but to me it always seemed that Bam had a character arc, even in the first season and even in the anime. Bam’s initial goal is to follow Rachel. By the end of season 1, Bam’s goal is to carry Rachel. For comparison this is all the character development Samwise Gamgee will get in the Lord of the Rings. Rachel’s betrayal works so well from a narrative standpoint because it happens at a time when Bam’s character arc has ended. At the time of the push incident, Bam has already changed and there are no “narrative promises” that make him have “plot armor” in the reader’s mind. Bam even gives us a little speech in chapter 73: “Even after this test… Let’s go up the tower together. I’ll… be your legs. […] I did [change]. I cut my hair, I change my clothes every day… and um… I also learned how to control the shinsu… I met a lot of people […] and I let go… of so many people…” Yes, all of Bam’s speeches have been cut or toned down in the anime but there are still traces of this particular speech. You mentioned that Bam’s decision to carry Rachel changed Khun. While I think this is correct, I would also argue that Bam had to be changed beforehand. The incident for this being Hoh’s suicide. So why is it that Bam is mostly perceived as a static character? I can only guess. Maybe the transition from following to carrying is just so natural that people assumed it would happen. They might also conflate the two. Maybe you could shine some light on this.

TOG is master piece

Great video! I felt so much of what you said here. I definitely jumped into this game with no clue what I was doing! Then went the other extreme of thinking I needed to spend half my life formally studying to make up for it. I don't regret these choices per se, since they brought me to many great opportunities and connections, but I do wonder how things might have turned out if I took the time to stand back and assess the landscape more thoroughly before I acted.

Hey, Bardic! Seeing as I did a whole podcast series on how almost everything to do with writing advice as we see it on social media is totally bogus, I love this! I think the most harmful thing about the kinds of click-bait, listicle writing advice we see on social media especially platforms like Pinterest, is how EASY it makes writing sound. Writing is many things, but honestly? It's always easier to drown in blog post after blog post about what to do and not to do than it is to actually write, on top of the fact that the content of many of these blog posts is nothing but fluff.